India: The South

India has long fascinated naturalists and travelers alike, and it’s easy to see why. The fabulously rich wildlife, the cultural and geographic diversity, and the Indian people themselves combine to make this a fascinating place to visit again and again.

Compared with the north, southern India has been relatively poorly explored by visiting birdwatchers, a fact that is all the more surprising considering the high number of species that are either endemic to peninsular India or shared only with neighboring Sri Lanka. Southern India is strikingly different from the north in so many ways: life is seemingly more relaxed and a good deal more genteel. The south’s magnificent coastline is caressed by balmy tropical winds and nurtured by monsoon rains. On this tour we’ll visit some of southern India’s startlingly rich nature reserves and spectacular resorts in search of the region’s special avifauna. We’ll spend time in India’s three southernmost states, Karnataka, Tamil Nadu, and Kerala; we’ll birdwatch near tea plantations in the Western Ghats and Nilgiri mountains; and we’ll study shorebirds on the Coromandel coast and hunt for endemics in several of the region’s best national parks.

We also offer an exciting optional extension to the sun-drenched tropical paradise of the Andaman Islands, an archipelago closer to Myanmar than the Indian mainland and home to another 19 endemics.